"Phone calls. But it was typical breaking-up kind of stuff," Abby Sexton said, wrinkling her nose. "The problem was, she didn't want to share. I mean, she wanted to stay with Ruth while we went out-you know about Ruth?-but she didn't want me with Mark. But I like men and told her I was going to stay with Mark. So then I suggested that we share Mark, that we three get together. But she wasn't into that. She'd be happy enough to share a man, but not an employee, if you can believe that."

"Huh. So she wasn't strictly gay?"

"Not strictly-technically a bi, I guess, like Mark and me," she said.

He digested that for a moment, then smiled at them, apologetically, and asked, "Where were you the evening before last? Here in the Cities?"

"We got a babysitter, Sandra Oduchenko, who lives down the street, and she came at seven o'clock, and we went out clubbing with some friends," Abby Sexton said. "We are completely alibied, up to our necks. That's why we didn't call a lawyer. Do you want everybody's names?"

Virgil took the names down, and then asked, "Who do you think did it?"

Abby Sexton rolled her eyes up and took a deep breath. Her husband deferred to her, and she said, "We definitely think it's possible that it was somebody with the agency. If we had to take a guess-you're not going to tell anybody that we said this, right?-we'd say Ronald Owen."

Ronald Owen, she said, was in his late fifties and for the past five or ten years, had slipped from being one of the top account managers to being something less than that: the guy who got small stuff, and who no longer did much with it.

"He burned out," Mark Sexton chipped in. "But he's got kids and alimony and a second wife and he can't afford to quit. The other thing is, he's one of those veteran guys you see around-he was in Vietnam toward the end of the war, and all of that. He's bitter about the way everything turned out. He's also got good sources, so I suspect he knew about McDill taking over. And he hunts. Every year. People kid him about it, but he goes off and shoots antelope in Montana, and deer in Wisconsin. He's really into guns. He's always talking about how the rest of us don't know about real life. He says we get life from Whole Foods. He calls us Whole Foodies."

They had another suggestion, a John Yao, "An Asian, who's always creeping around. He runs some Asian business accounts, local stuff, Hmong businesses. He's another gun guy. I get a really bad feeling from him," Mark said. They had nothing specific about Yao-no suggestion that he was about to get fired, except that his accounts were "ratshit stuff. Small, insignificant. McDill might have decided to get rid of them."

VIRGIL BROUGHT THE TALK BACK to the Sexton-McDill relationship. "From what you knew of her, was she sexually predatory? When she was with you, was she drifting away from Ruth, and looking for another long-term relationship? Or was she really going out on the town?"

"Mmm. She definitely didn't like me leaving-but I think her relationship with Ruth was about done. And I knew that our relationship wouldn't have lasted, and she was smart enough to know that, too."

"Might there have been another relationship after you? Somebody that Ruth didn't know about?"

She shook her head: "I don't know. I'd tell you, but I don't know."

"If she did," Mark said, "it wasn't with anyone associated with the agency. Word would have gotten around-there are no secrets in that place."

VIRGIL ASKED a few more questions, but basically had written them off as suspects: their alibis would be too easy to check, so he doubted that they'd be lying. He ran out of follow-up questions, asked them for any last thoughts, and stood up.

As he did, the baby started crying, its voice squeaking out through the intercom.

"You're up," Abby Sexton said to her husband, and he hurried off. "We try to split the baby chores exactly fifty-fifty," she said.

She trailed Virgil to the door, and as he went out, he said, "Listen, thank you for your help, and I may get back to you."

She stepped a foot too close and put a hand on his triceps and said, "Do you do any clubbing? Here in the Cities? I notice you're not wearing a wedding ring."

"I'm, uh, mostly down south of the Cities," Virgil said, edging away.

"Well, give us a call if you're in town," she said. "We enjoy creative relationships."

He bobbed his head and hastened away. Creative relationships, my ass. He really didn't like them-and he really didn't think they were involved in the murder of Erica McDill.

Ruth Davies? That was a more interesting proposition…

Virgil glanced back. Abby Sexton was still on her porch, and she waved.

He waved back, and was gone; and thought to himself, as he turned the corner, Do not imagine Mark Sexton naked in bed.

NOON. He called Mann from his truck and asked, "How long is that meeting going to last?"

"I don't know, but it'll be a while. People are freaking out. Everybody'll want to talk for eight minutes, so that'll be an hour and a half of bullshit before we get to the hard stuff."

"Do you have a number and address for a Ronald Owen?" Virgil asked.

"Sure. What does Ron have to do with this?"

"Don't know. I want to ask him," Virgil said.

"That fuckin' Sexton pointed you at him," Mann said. Not a question. "That little weasel. Listen, I'll vouch for Ron, if that means anything."

"What about John Yao?"

"Jesus. Pointed you right at the two non-yuppie fucks in the office," Mann said.

"Would McDill have fired them?"

After a minute of silence, Mann said, "Ron, probably. She didn't like him and he didn't like her back. John Yao, probably not. He's got good connections in the Asian community here, and they do a surprising amount of business with us in one way or another."

"Mark Sexton said that his accounts didn't amount to anything," Virgil said.

"That's because Mark's a dumbass," Mann said. "None of John's accounts are huge and they don't do TV or glamour stuff-it's all business-to-business work-but taken all together, they bring a nice lump of change."

"So Yao was safe, but Owen, probably not," Virgil said.

"Yes. And Erica and John get along," Mann said. "Don't know why-chemistry or something. They got along."

"What's Owen's address?" Virgil asked.

"I feel like a rat giving you all of this," Mann said.

"I'd get it anyway," Virgil said. "If Owen didn't do it, might as well clear him out."

OWEN LIVED TWENTY MILES northeast of Minneapolis, in rural Grant Township. Virgil headed that way, got a buzz on his cell phone, looked at it: Davenport.

"Yeah?"

"You still in Grand Rapids?"

"No. I'm in North St. Paul, headed out toward Mahtomedi, talking to a guy who didn't like McDill." Virgil filled him in on what he'd learned, and what he planned to do the rest of the morning, before heading north again.

"Stacy and her crew started processing McDill's house last night," Davenport said. "They should be out there for the rest of the day. Her father's there, you might want to check in."

"That's in Edina, right?" He'd written McDill's address in his notebook; either Edina or Eagan.

"Yes. Her girlfriend got back last night and made a fuss, but that's straightened out now," Davenport said. "What's the story on the girlfriend?"

"Still thinking about her," Virgil said.

"Okay. Stay in touch."

OWEN' S HOUSE SAT at the crest of a hill. A fifties-era ranch-style, the house had a later wing stuck on one end, with a garage and a shop building in back, on what Virgil thought might be ten acres. At the top of the gravel driveway, Virgil saw a man in jeans and a T-shirt watching him from the edge of a stand of sweet corn in a sprawling hillside garden. Owen, he thought.

He parked beside a Chevy pickup, got out, looked around-the whole country smelled like fresh-cut hay and dry gravel-then walked up to the front door. The inner door was open, and he knocked on the screen door. He could hear music playing inside, but couldn't identify it. A fiftyish brown-haired woman came to the door, wiping her hands on a towel, and peered through the screen. She smiled and asked, "Can I help you?"